FOUR ACES : Award-Winning Family From Camarillo Banks Future Tennis Success on Abilities of Top-Ranked 10-Year-Old Twin Boys

To Wayne Bryan, learning the proper way to swing a baseball bat is no more useful to a youngster than mastering the nuances of Pac-Man at a video arcade. Time spent fielding fungoes might be better spent watching sitcom reruns.

America’s pastime, Bryan argues, offers little opportunity to advance beyond the level of high school competition and provides even less exercise. Tennis, he says, is a viable alternative.

“There’s a lot of fat baseball players,” Bryan says. “I don’t think baseball does a lot for you athletically. You do a lot of standing. You take your 25 swings in the batting cage and then maybe you’ve burned 100 calories if you’re lucky and now you just go stand in the outfield.

“Tennis is exercise. It’s healthy. It’s wonderful. I think all these kids should be playing tennis, not baseball. They might as well be riding skateboards because they’re not going to be doing that either.”

But a forehand is forever. It figures that Bryan would tout tennis--he is the general manager and co-owner of the Cabrillo Racquet Club, a sprawling, 17-court facility in Camarillo.

Wayne and Kathy Bryan live about three miles from the club with their 10-year-old identical twins, Mike and Bob. The family was awarded the Southern California Tennis Assn. and U. S. Tennis Assn. Pacific Region Family of the Year honors in February based on their contributions to amateur tennis.

The 14-state Pacific Region, includes the Texas, Inner-Mountain, Pacific Northwest, Southwestern, Southern and Northern California, and Hawaii Pacific tennis associations. The Dutch Vosters family of Wilmington, Del. won the overall USTA title.

The Vosters presented formidable competition. Among other victories, Madge and Gretchen Vosters have won 26 national mother-and-daughter championships. “It’s one of these legendary deals,” SCTA president Bob Kramer said of the Vosters. “They’ve got this institutional kind of edge.”

If Wayne has his way, it won’t be long before the Bryans have a similar advantage. The elder half of the family already has made its mark on the tennis world and the twins are beginning to etch theirs.

Kathy, formerly Kathy Blake, was the 1962 USTA girls’ national champion for 16 year olds and won the girls’ national doubles hard-court title the following year. On the professional tour in the late 1960s, she ranked as high as 11th in the world in singles and second in doubles.

She played Wimbledon four times, reaching the semifinals in mixed doubles once. She also advanced to the quarterfinals of the women’s doubles in one of her five appearances in the U. S. Open.

In addition, Kathy, 42, has a place in the Guinness Book of World Records for playing the longest women’s professional match in history--a grueling 62-game match against Elena Subirates that Blake won, 12-10, 6-8, 14-12. As long as the current tiebreaker rules are maintained, the record will remain.

Although he never reached a level comparable to that of his wife, Wayne, 42, has enjoyed his athletic triumphs. After earning all-league honors as a quarterback at Hawthorne High, Bryan opted to play tennis on scholarship at UC Santa Barbara from 1965 to ’69. During his junior and senior seasons, he was the Gauchos’ captain and top player.

He played on the professional tour briefly in the early 1970s and was ranked No. 1 by the SCTA in the doubles division for 35 year olds in 1983-84 and No. 2 in singles the same year. Next month, he will receive the Tretorn Tennis Award at the Virginia Slims tournament in Manhattan Beach for his commitment to the sport.

Bryan was a pioneer in the establishment of the Southern California Grand Prix system, which allows amateur A, B, C and D players to participate in a series of local tournaments. The program, called the Chrysler Tennis Series last year, culminates in a masters’ playoffs in January. The series has blossomed to include more than 10,000 players.

The couple’s twins show promise of eclipsing the achievements of their parents. The twins are currently ranked second and third in the SCTA 10-and-under singles division and are the top-ranked doubles team. They have, for the time being, stopped victimizing opponents in their own age group and are now raiding tournament titles from the 12- and 14-and-under divisions. More than 200 plaques and trophies earned on the courts the past five years adorn their bedroom walls.

The first few times his then-3-year-old tots begged to dink the ball around with him, Bryan employed a little reverse psychology.

“Nope, I’m tired,” he would respond. “Maybe tomorrow.”

Eventually, he tantalized his sons by hitting with them for three minutes a day--just enough to whet their appetites. In addition, he took them to professional tournaments and exhibitions to further develop their interest.

“You go to the Dodgers game and it’s sort of inspirational,” he said. “If you watch (baseball) on TV, suddenly the kid wants to be a major league baseball player. It can be done just the same in tennis. Go to the Davis Cup matches, go to the Palm Springs tournament, go to the Volvo tournament, go to the Ojai tournament, go to the college matches.”

The Bryans do. In fact, Wayne has arranged encounters with well-known professionals that have proven even more inspirational to his sons than watching tournaments. The boys have shared a pizza with John McEnroe. They have had a burger with Boris Becker. “They have had things that have inspired the living hell out of them,” Bryan said.

Some parents, Bryan says, make tennis a living hell for their children.

“I don’t see people berating their child, abusing their child, beating their child. It’s very subtle psychology, ‘Well, what happened? ‘ “ Bryan says, raising his voice to a whine. “It sounds like, ‘Go make your bed.’ ”

Instead, the Bryans have chosen to leave much of their boys’ instruction to other coaches.

“We don’t believe in lashing them to a tennis court,” Kathy said. “But we’re constantly stimulating them to the wide variety of the things going on in the tennis world. And they can’t help but be awed by it and enjoy it.”

Sure, the boys bicker on the court. “We’ve had matches where there’s been a lot more contention on their side of the net than there has been with the opponent,” Kathy said. In order to maintain a little brotherly love-love, challenge matches between Mike and Bob have been outlawed by their parents. Last year, if the two were to meet in a tournament singles final, one would default. This practice was continued on an alternating basis.

“Every kid who wants to play tennis wants to be the best at his club, his region, the world,” Wayne reasons. “You can’t be No. 1 in the world if you’re No. 2 at home. It’s an immediate block by your own brother. We find plenty of people to play without them playing each other.”

Bryan also fears another scenario could occur. “They’ll play in a tournament and one beats the other and the winner just spurts up. What happens to the other one? Zzzzzt ,” he said, pointing his thumb to the floor. “Toilet time.”

In addition to tennis, Bob plays piano and Mike plays drums. Their interest in music probably stems from Wayne, a vocalist and keyboard player in The Inside Group, a Ventura County-based band founded by Bryan and three tennis cronies. The group, which has a repertoire that ranges from the Rolling Stones to 1940s’ swing, plays at various social events, and the twins occasionally play with the band at parties and street fairs.

“Music balances you out,” Wayne said. “It gives you a good hobby--a good soul release.”

Bryan figures being well-balanced bodes well for the twins’ primary long-term goal: playing Division I collegiate tennis. Other goals include playing on the pro tour and winning a Wimbledon doubles title.

In time, however, the brothers might have to turn to each other for legitimate competition.

“If they can get to the point maturity-wise where they can work out together it will be wonderful for their games,” Kathy said. “But right now, they just can’t do it. They’re just too competitive.”